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.T54 

Copy 1 



THE UNITED STATES 
SINCE 1908 



Being Chapters XLVII-L of 

A History of the United States 

for Schools 



BY 



REUBEN GOLD THWAITES, LL.D, 

AND 

CALVIN NOYES KENDALL, LL.D. 




HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY 

BOSTON NEW VORK CHICAGO 



Ctfjright, 1918, 1919, by Jtuie P. Thwaites and Calvin Nojti Kendall 
All rights reserved 



THE TAPPAN-KENDALL SERIES OF 
ELEMENTARY HISTORIES 

By EVA MARCH TAPPAN, Ph.D., and 
CALVIN N. KENDALL, LL.D. 

Commissioner of Education for the State of New Jersey 

Book I. American Hero Stories. {For Grades IV-V.) 

By Eva March Tappan. Price, 60 cents. Postpaid. 
A logical introduction to Miss Tappa.n''s An E leme/iiaty History of Our Country. The 
stories are chronologically arranged and appealingly told. 

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{For Grades V-VI.) 

By Eva March Tappan. Price 68 cents. Postpaid. 
A short, connected, and interesting story of the course of events in our history since 
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By Eva March Tappan. Price 76 cents. Postpaid. 
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Schools. {For Grades VII-V III.) Price «Si.2o. Postpaid. 
By Reuben Gold Thwaites, LL.D., and Calvin N. Kendall, LL.D 

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Speeches and Addresses on Democracy and Patriotism, 1776-1918. River- 
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British and American Poems of the World War. Edited by George Her- 
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HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY 

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THE UNITED STATES 
SINCE 1908 

Being Chapters XLVII-L of 

A History of the United States 

for Schools 

BY 

REUBEN GOLD THWAITES, LL.D. 

AND 

CALVIN NOYES KENDALL, LL,D. 




HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY 

BOSTON NEW VORK CHICAGO 



Ccfjright, 191S, 1919, bj Jessie P. Thwaites and Calvin Noycs Kendall 
All rights reserved 



u 






CHAPTER XLVII 

TAFT's ADMINISTRATION: INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS 
TARIFF AND RECIPROCITY: THE INSURGENT MOVEMENT 

421. William Howard Taft. No President of the United 
States has ever had three terms in office, and Washington 
(see page 223) urged that two be made the limit. Accord- 

( ingly President Roosevelt refused to 

be a candidate for a third time in 
1908. He advised, instead, that his 
friend and Secretary of War, Wil- 
liam Howard Taft,^ of Ohio, be nom- 
inated to succeed him. The Demo- 
crats for the third time nominated 
William Jennings Bryan, and in the 
debate that followed each party told 
copvr,ght,im,by Moffett studio ^lic pcoplc that It would try to carry 
WILLIAM H. TAFT out the pohcics of social betterment 
that had been much discussed since 
1900. Mr. Taft was elected, and at once called Congress 
to meet in special session to fulfill the pledges. 

422. The tariff is revised. There were some differences 
of opinion among the Republicans as to how to revise the 
tariff. Most of those who lived in the Eastern States, 

_ 1 William H. Taft was born in Ohio in 1857, graduated from Yale Univer- 
sity in 1878, and began life as a lawyer in Cincinnati. Before being elected 
president he was judge in Ohio (1887-90), a solicitor-general of the United 
States (1890-92), aUnited States circuit judge (1892-1900), president of the 
United States Philippine Commission (1900-04), and Secretary of War in 
President Roosevelt's Cabinet (1904-08). While in the last-named office he 
adjusted the Cuban insurrection, was for a time provisional governor of that 
island, and went around the world on various duties connected with the Fed- 
eral Government. After leaving the White House he became a professor of 
law in Yale University, and in 1918 reentered the service of the Government 
as head of the National War Labor Board which is engaged in adjusting labor 
disputes. 

0CI.A 515613 




REVISION OF THE TARIFF 



¥^5 



"^i 



where the great factories are, were content with the Dingley 
bill as it was (see page 437). But in some of the Western 
States, where many Republicans were farmers, they thought 
the high tariff made prices high, and wanted the rates 
educed. Presi- 



^ dent Taft did 

^ not try to make 

Congress pass his 

own kind of a 

tariff , but waited 

>-- until Congress 

had done its work 

^ in August and 

\ then signed what 

was called the 

Payne-Aldrich 

tariff. By this 

time the discon- 




TR ACTOR ENGINE, DRAWING PLOUGHS 

Gasoline engines are used not only in ploughing, but also for supplying 
power for harvesting and haying machines, and for all farm uses. 
Formerly horses or oxen were used 



tented \\'estern Republicans were complaining because the 
rates of duties were not being lowered and were saying that 
the high tariff Republicans were reactionary, or " stand 
pat," and favored the trusts. 

423. The Insurgents. A few of the discontented Repub- 
licans were so open in fighting the Payne-Aldrich tariff 
that they were called Insurgents, and as the Insurgents 
they steadily opposed President Taft from this time. In 
1910 the Insurgents and Democrats, voting together, were 
able to defeat Republican bills, and in the fall elections of 
that year the quarrel in the Republican party made it pos- 
sible for the Democrats to elect a majority of the House 
of Representatives, — for the first time since 1892. In the 
new Congress, that met in 1911, Champ Clark, of Mis- 
souri, a Democrat, was chosen Speaker. 

424. The progressive measures. The chief demands of 
the Insurgents were for changes in the machinery of gov- 
ernment so as to let the people more truly rule themselves. 
They claimed that the party caucus and nominating con- 



466 THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER 




vention made it possible for corrupt bosses to control them 
and to defy the people's will; and that the courts were 
too conservative and too willing to declare progressive 

laws unconstitu- 
tional and void. 
Sometimes the 
courts declared 
void laws lim- 
iting the hours 
of labor on the 
ground that such 
limits interfered 
with the right of 
free contract ; in 
this they failed 
to recognize the 
fact that in mod- 
ern industry the 
w^orkman must 
take his job as 
it is, and has no right of free contract except to accept 
the job as offered or go without work. 

425. Election reforms. The last great victory for pop- 
ular government, the Australian ballot, had made it possi- 
ble for every man to vote in secrecy as he pleased without 
fear of punishment because of his vote. Now the short 
ballot was asked for, so as to reduce the number of indi- 
vidual candidates to be voted for, and make it possible for 
the voter to know something about each of them. The 
initiative was now advocated, — a" measure allowing citi- 
zens by petition to start or initiate a new law. The referen- 
dum was a means of determining upon the final passage of 
a law by popular vote. It had long been used in the adop- 
tion of State constitutions, or local debts, or prohibition, 
and was next to be extended to general laws. The recall 
was a method of removing from office by popular referen- 
dum officials who had behaved badly and so had lost the 



Copyright, Vnderioood and Underwood 

A COMBINED REAPING AND THRESHING 
MACHINE 

The earliest reaping machine was drawn by two horses. In those days 
thresliiug was done with flails, after the grain had been taken to the 
barns 



INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS 467 

confidence of the people. Some wanted the recall to ex- 
tend even to unpopular decisions of the courts. The direct 
primary was to be a new method of nominating officers. 
It w^as to be in substance a preliminary election with the 
party, protected by law, as the result of which candidates 
to represent the party in the final election were to be 
chosen. The candidates at the primary were to be selected 
by the petitions of their friends. The corrupt practices act 
was a law to punish candidates who spent too much money 
upon their election or who used unfair or dishonest meth- 
ods. All of these mechanical reforms were popular among 
progressive citizens as well as among the Insurgents. 

426. Peace and reciprocity. President Taft was deeply 
interested in maintaining friendly relations with all the 
world. During 191 1 he tried in various ways to make peace 
more secure. 

(a) He arranged an agreement for reciprocity with Can- 
ada, by which certain products of Canada would be admitted 
freely into the United States in return for similar treatment 
of American goods going into Canada. 

{h) He also negotiated with England a treaty for the 
arbitration of any causes which might arise in the future, 
thus advancing the policy of peaceful settlement of dis- 
putes in which the Geneva arbitration (see page 403) is so 
great an example. The first of these, reciprocity, was re- 
jected by Canada; the second, arbitration, by the United 
States Senate. But President Taft was more successful 
in ending the old difficulty with England over the New- 
foundland Fisheries, and in reaching a friendly agreement 
with Japan concerning the immigration of Japanese into 
the United States. 

427. Mexico in trouble. The LTnited States does not 
protect its frontiers with forts, and expects to live in peace 
with all its neighbors. This fact made it difficult to pro- 
tect the people in Texas when, in 191 1, a civil war broke 
out in Mexico, and the rebels sometimes crossed the Rio 
Grande into the United States, robbing and murdering 



468 THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER 

peaceful American citizens. General Porfirio Diaz, who 
had been president of Mexico for nearly thirty-five years, 
and who protected private property while exploiting the 
national resources, was driven out of the country by 
Francisco Madero, who succeeded to his position. Ma- 




AN ARMY ENCAMPMENT NEAR THE MEXICAN FRONTIER 



dero claimed to be trying to improve the position of the 
plain farmers, who are generally part Indian in blood, and 
entirely uneducated; but he was not able to keep law and 
order. To protect Texas and to prevent bad Americans 
from aiding in the Mexican revolt. President Taft sta- 
tioned a large part of the army along the border; but he 
refused to profit by Mexico's trouble or to invade the 
country. Early in 1913, Madero was murdered, and suc- 
ceeded by General Huerta, whom many believed to have 
been his murderer. 

428. The forty-eighth star. During Taft's administra- 
tion the forty-seventh and fort^^-eighth stars were added 
to the American flag. The old policy of making states out 



LABOR AND CAPITAL 



469 



of territories was completed. Most of the States of the 
mountain region had been admitted in 1889-90 (North 
Dakota, South Dakota, Montana, W'yoming, Idaho, and 
Washington). Utah, the forty-fifth, had followed in 1896. 
Oklahoma had come in 1907. The only two territories 
remaining after the admission of Oklahoma, were New 
Mexico and Arizona. These territories had gained in pop- 
ulation slowly because so much of their land was dry and 
barren. Now, at last, New Mexico in 191 1 and Arizona 
in 1912, completed the process of making free states out of 
free people. The habit of the frontier to be more extreme 




THE WESTWARD MOVEMENT, 1 790-1910 
. * Center of population ; ^. center of manufacturea 



in its democracy than the rest of the country was shown 
in the case of Arizona. Because of an article in the constitu- 
tion of this State providing for the recall of Judges, Presi- 
dent Taft was unwilling to have the State admitted to the 
Union. Accordingly the people of Arizona withdrew the 
offending article until after their admission; whereupon 
they amended the constitution to restore it. In Oklahoma 
the new State proceeded to provide for a State guarantee 
of the safety of money deposited in banks. A century 
earlier the Western States had showed their liberalism by 
removing the restrictions upon the right to vote. 

429. Labor and capitaL The last year of Taft's adminis- 
tration was marked by a great strike at Lawrence, Massa- 
chusetts, that showed how all the progress of the last gen- 



470 THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER 

eratlon had left the relations of the worker to his employer 
still unsatisfactory. Organization of labor in unions in- 
creased steadily after the Civil War. The greatest of the 
national unions were the Knights of Labor (1869), a secret 
society at first; and the American Federation of Labor 
(1881), which was made up of local labor organizations. 
These worked for the right of workmen to belong to unions 
and to strike to improve their conditions; and urged upon 
Congress and State legislatures the passage of laws limit- 
ing the hours of regulating the conditions of labor. They 






A GREAT STEEL PLANT 



were hampered in the work by the excesses of the revolu- 
tionary Industrial Workers of the World, who came later 
and taught that workmen need not obey the law, and that 
sabotage or deliberate injury to the employer's property 
was a proper means of enforcing their demands. The strike 
at Lawrence brought out in sharp and alarming clearness 
the revolutionary character of the radical leaders and the 
need for an honest study of the problems of labor. 

430. *' Unscrambling " the trusts. " Big business " was 
in as much trouble as labor was. The greed and unscrupu- 
lousness of some of its "captains of industry" aroused the 
fear and distrust of the people. President Roosevelt, in 
1902, started suit against one of the greatest of the rail- 



THE PROGRESSIVE PARTY 471 

road combinations, the Northern Securities Company, and 
succeeded in breaking it up. Later Government prosecu- 
tions attacked similarly the Standard Oil Co. and the Steel 
Corporation, as well as many lesser trusts. Some of these 
were dissolved. But it began to be seen that punishment 
was not the best way to regulate business; that the bad 
part of the trust was not so much its existence as its e\il 
behavior; and that laws to correct the behavior of business 
concerns ought to be passed. One of the great trust mag- 
nates had asked of the "trust busters": "Can you un- 
scramble eggs?" The answer seemed to be that the eggs, 
or trusts, could be unscrambled, but that it was better to 
cook them right at first. 

431. The Progressive party. The split in the Republi- 
can party became wider as the election of 191 2 drew nearer. 
President Taft wished to be renominated, and had the 
support of the "stand-pat" element in the party. The 
Insurgents opposed his nomination, and began in 191 1 to 
call themselves Progressive Republicans. They wanted one 
of their number to be the candidate. Others in the party 
feared that after the defeat in Congress in 1910 neither 
Taft nor any Progressive could be elected, and accordingly 
hoped that ex-President Roosevelt could be induced to be a 
candidate. Roosevelt had gone to Africa on a hunting-trip 
after 1909, and then to Europe to lecture in 1910. He had 
supported the progressive measures of the Insurgents after 
his return. People who opposed him insisted that no man 
ought to have a third term; his friends said the objection 
was only to a third consecutive term. In February, 191 2, 
he announced himself as a candidate for the nomination; 
but the Republican National convention renominated Taft. 
Upon this, the Progressive Republicans held a convention 
of their own, formed the Progressive party, and nominated 
Colonel Roosevelt. 



472 THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER 



QUESTIONS AND SUGGESTIONS 

1. What are the two main positions taken to-day in regard to the 
tariff? 

2. Compare the Insurgents of 1910 with the founders of the Republican 
party. 

3. Locate New Mexico and Arizona on the map. What States were 
not first organized as territories, as a prehminary to admission to 
the Union? (Refer to Appendix C.) 

4. Compare President Taft's treatment of Mexico and President Polk's. 

COMPOSITION SUBJECTS 

1. Imagine that Thomas Jefferson attended President Taft's inaugu- 
ration. Write the conversation that might have taken place be- 
tween him and Mr. Taft. 

2. Describe an imaginary trip with President Taft to the Philippine 
Islands. 

3. Imagine you were an American living in Mexico during the revolu- 
tion in 1910-11. Tell of your experiences. 



CHAPTER XLVIII 




Wilson's administration: social progress since the 

CIVIL war: tariff, trusts, and finance: the MON- 
ROE DOCTRINE 

432. Woodrow Wilson. The Republican split gave the 
Democrats their chance. Mr. Bryan, who had been defeated 
three times (in 1896, 1900, and 1908) was not a candidate 
himself, but was able to prevent the 
nomination of any one of whom he 
disapproved. After a long fight, in 
which the friends of the various 
candidates stuck stubbornly to their 
choice, the party chose Governor 
Woodrow Wilson.^ Their platform 
included many of the progressive 
measures that the Insurgents had 
wanted, and included also a demand 
that the Payne-Aldrich tariff be re- 
vised. In the resulting canvass Mr. 
Wilson received a huge majority 
electoral vote, because the Republican vote was divided. He 
had more popular votes than either Roosevelt or Taft, but 
had only a minority of all. The Socialist party cast nearly 
a million votes in this election, becoming for the first time 
an important national party. ^ 

1 Woodrow Wilson was born in Virginia in 1856. He was graduated at 
Princeton University in 1879; studied history and politics at Johns Hopkins 
University, 1883-85; practiced law at Atlanta, Georgia; he was a professor 
in Bryn Mawr College, 1886-88; in Wesleyan University; in Princeton I'ni- 
versity, 1890-1902; president of Princeton, 1902-10; and governor of New 
Jersey, 1911-13; holding this office when elected President of the United States. 

^ The Socialist party received 895,000 votes in this election. It had been 
growing rapidly since the Spanish War, receiving in I9(X), 94,000 votes; in 
1904, 402,000; in 1908, 420,000. It had always been managed largely by 



Copyright, 1912, Moffett, Chicago 

WOODROW WILSON 



474 THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER 

433. Changes in Congress and the Constitution. Presi- 
dent Wilson was inaugurated on March 4, 1913. A few 
days later he met Congress, which he had called to revise 
the tariff. He read his message to it himself, the first Presi- 
dent since Jefferson to do so. It had become the custom for 
Presidents to send long messages in writing, but Mr. Wilson 
now began a habit of making them brief and to the point, 

and reading the 
more important 
messages in person. 
The Constitution 
too was changing. 
There had been no 
new amendments 
since the close of 
the Civil War, 
when the slavery 
amendments were 
adopted. Among 
the earliest acts of 
Secretary of State 
Bryan, in 191 3, was 
his proclamation 
that a sixteenth 
amendment, giving 
Congress power to 
lay a tax on incomes, and a seventeenth providing for the 
direct election of senators, had been approved by the re- 
quired three fourths of the States, and were in force. 

434. The Changing World, Aircraft and Motors. The 
world that Lincoln knew had shrunk since the days of 
Washington, and people then told themselves that the 
railroad and the electric telegraph had changed the face of 
things. Before W^ilson was inaugurated the world narrowed 

German-Americans, and after the outbreak of war in 1917 it placed itself on 
record as opposed to the war. Many of its strongest loyal members, including 
Benson, its presidential nominee in 191 6, resigned from it after this, and the 
influence of the party was weakened. 




THE UNITED STATES HALL OF 
REPRESENTATIVES 

Showing the new arrangement of seats. In the old arrangement 
each representative had liis private desk. Members now do 
tlieir personal business in their offices in the Senate and House 
office buildings 



MODERN INVENTIONS 



475 



still more.^ The amount of work that one man could do 
was multiplied.'- The reaper, that Cyrus McCormick had 
begun to make before the Civil 
War, had brought the great 
West under cultivation. The 
sewing-machine of Howe, and 
the shoe-machine of McKay, 
had made new industries pos- 
sible. The telephone of Bell 
was patented in 1876, and 
made instant communication 
possible in the country as well 
as in the towns. The electric 
light as well as the electric 
street car and the bicycle came 
along in the eighties, and in 
the nineties inventors began 
to experiment with "horse- 
less carriages," or motorcars.'' 
These, convenient, cheap, and 
reliable, multiplied by millions 
before 191 3, and the gas-engine 

1 Commander Robert E. Peary dis- 
covered the North Pole on April 6, 1909. 
For three hundred years courageous ex- 
plorers had tried to push across the great 
waste region of ice and snow to reach 
that goal. Peary had been working at it 
for a quarter of a century. His achieve- 
ment was rewarded by Congress, which 
made him a Rear Admiral, and by learned 
societies all over the world that granted 

him medals and diplomas. Admiral Peary has of late years led in the campaign 
for the development of the American air-plane service. 

On December 14, 191 1, Captain Roald Amundsen, of Norway, reached th& 
South Pole. Nearly the whole world is now known to its inhabitants. 

2 In September, 1909, New York celebrated the one hundredth anniversary 
of the navigation of the Hudson River by P^ulton's steamboat, as well as the 
three hundredth anniversary of Henry Hudson, the discoverer of the river. 

3 The first automobile show in America was held in New York in 1900. 
To-day the millions of motor-cars in use make possible living in the suburbs, 
taking easy pleasure trips, and extend the limit of business in every direction. 
Some of the factories can make as many as half a million cars in a single ^ear. 




PhotograiiU bi/ Broicii Brothert 



C0MM.\XDER PE.\RY 
Who discovered the North Pole 




476 THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER 

that drove them was modified so as to drive airships. The 
successful airplanes of the Wright brothers gave the United 
States another great invention, ^ about 1905 ; and in less than 
five years more a daring Frenchman had flown across the 
English Channel from France to England. An Italian, Mar- 
coni, added wire- 
less telegraphy, 
and Americans, 
Simon Lake and 
J. P. Holland, built 
submarine ships. 
435. Social pro- 
gress. The great 
inventions, and 
the prosperity of 
America brought 
about the growth 
of large cities, 
most of whose in- 
habitants were engaged in work at the various industries, 
and many of whom were poor. City government had not 
improved in quality with the growth of the cities, and re- 
forms in housing, lighting, sewage, water-supply, and edu- 
cation engaged the attention of public-spirited people. In 
some years more than a million immigrants .had come to 
the United States, drawn by our free institutions, and by 
the better chances for themselves and their children that 
existed here. Because these could speak little English they 
were easily imposed upon. Some of their selfish leaders 
even tried to keep alive their old language at school, at 

1 In the year 1900 the Wright brothers, of Dayton, Ohio, began air-glid- 
ing. In 1903 they added a gasoline engine to their glider and thus converted 
it into a heavier-than-air flying-machine; but it was not until 1908 that they 
were ready to make exhibition flights. Other adventurous inventors were 
experimenting with dirigible balloons. Airplanes are now used by all the 
armies. The United States designed in 191 7 a new high power engine for its 
war airplane, known as the Liberty Motor. An airplane mail service between 
New York and Washington and later between New York and Boston was 
started in 1918. 



A WRIGHT BIPLANE 

Compare with the war-balloon, page 371 



SOCIAL PROGRESS 477 

church, and in their newspapers. To help them, in the 
crowded slums where many of them lived, settlements had 
been opened. Jane Addams founded Hull House in Chicago 
in 1889, and similar centers of Americanism multiplied. 
Schools began to give manual training. High schools and 
colleges flourished, so that by 19 13 there was no country 
in the world where ordinary people had so good a start 
toward success in life. Drunkenness, which had always 




A M()I>I;R\ I,i)r(»M()Tl\'E 

Length, 120 feet ; weight, 425 tons. This is one of tlie oil-burning freight locomotives built by the 
Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe Kailioad. Compare witli the earliest locomotives, page 266 

been the plague of the poor, was decreasing. State after 
State, and county after county under local option, were 
adopting prohibition. In 191 7 Congress adopted a national 
amendment for prohibition, and sent it out to the States 
for ratification. 

436. What the people thought. The religion, literature, 
and pleasures of the people show what they really are. The 
United States, with 91,972,266 inhabitants in 1910 (see 
table, appendix, page xx), was simple and clean in its 
amusements, and had ideals that it was not ashamed to 
show. President Roosevelt's demand for a ''square deal" 
for every one expressed the desire of a nation that loved 
clean sport and hated a cheat. The great churches that were 
being built, from the massive cathedrals in New York, to 
humble missions in little towns, measured an interest in 
things of the spirit that prosperity had not lessened. Cheap 
and good magazines, and newspapers that were nearly as 
good, provided literature for the millions, less artistic than 
the best, but so far above the ordinary that most of its read- 
ers profited by it. The day of Longfellow and Lowell, Haw- 



478 THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER 

thorne and Cooper, had changed into a new day of Clemens 
(IMark Twain) and Howells and O. Henry. Throughout the 
literature and religion ran unceasingly the old American 
ideals of real democracy. Even the moving pictures, which 
had become more popular than the theater had ever been, 
expressed these same notions of democracy, and their reels 
spread into every section of the nation the views and ideas 
of all the rest. 




WOMAN SUFFRAGE IN THE UNITED STATES 

437. Shall women vote? New interest in the welfare of 
children, and foreign immigrants, and the poor, extended 
also to women who were at work. Factory laws, to protect 
them from injury and disease, and liability laws, to ensure 
them proper treatment when injured while at work, were 
passed by many States. These laws helped raise the ques- 
tion of the vote. When the United States began not even all 
men could vote. But every time a new State was made in 
the West the limitations were removed, By the end of the 
century religious tests and property tests had entirely disap- 
peared, and all American men of twenty-one had gained 



WOMAN SUFFRAGE 479 

the right to vote. In Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, and Idaho 
the women had received the same right. Some of them had 
been asking for it for a long time in other States, and about 
1905 the demand was made again, every year with greater 
force. Most of the Progressives, and many RepiibHcans and 
Democrats supported the movement for woman suffrage. 
Other Western States granted it to them, until by 19 18 
women could vote for President in eighteen States, . and 
President Wilson had urged Congress to pass a new amend- 
ment to the Constitution, extending the right over the whole 
country. 

438. The Underwood tariff. Tariff reduction was the 
first thing the Democrats had promised to bring about. 
Under President Wilson's leadership, and at his actual 
direction. Congress passed a new law in 191 3. This law 
increased the number of articles that could be imported 
without paying a duty, and included a tax upon incomes 
which had been authorized by the sixteenth amendment. 
There is no fairer way of taxing than to make each citizen 
contribute to the support of the Government according to 
his earnings or income. Most other countries had adopted 
income taxes before we did. 

439. The federal reserve banks. Congress next set to 
work upon the banking system. It is the business of banks 
to take care of money deposited by them, and to lend money 
or credit to people who are known to be honest and reliable. 
All men in business have to borrow from the banks; and if 
the supply of money to be loaned them gives out, there 
may be a financial panic. Sometimes this supply gives out 
in one State when there is plenty of money in the next 
State, but we had never had a banking system that was 
flexible, or able quickly to shift credit to the places where it 
was needed most. The great panic of 1893, and a smaller 
panic in 1907, showed how great was the need for financial 
reform. Under the new federal reserv^e system, adopted in 
1913, the country is divided into twelve districts, in each 
of which there is a federal reserv^e bank, with which all the 



480 THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER 

local banks may have business dealings. And through these 
reserve banks our money and credit have been made flexible 
enough to meet our needs. 

440. The trusts and the Federal Trade Commission. The 
trusts are great business concerns that are able to control 
the prices of the things they sell, and are sometimes able 
to bribe members of legislatures in order to get special 
favors for themselves. Their existence had been noticed 
for thirty years; but no one knew just what to do with them. 
The Progressives had demanded trust control in 19 12, and 
every one approved w^hen Congress passed in 191 4 a new 
law forbidding unfair practices in business, and another 
creating a Federal Trade Commission to study and control 
big business. With the tariff' reduced, and the banks reor- 
ganized, and the trusts curbed, it seemed by the summer of 
1914 as if' the people of the United States might hope for a 
long period of peace, happiness, and prosperity. 

441. The new Monroe Doctrine. Mexico was still dis- 
turbed by her revolution, and General Huerta was unable 
to restore order; and injury to American property in Mex- 
ico, or to Americans along the border in Texas, was great. 
Some Americans thought the United States ought to inter- 
vene in Mexico with an army, restore order, and "clean up" 
the country. Many of the people in Mexico feared that the 
United States would take advantage of her trouble and use 
the superior strength of a great nation to conquer her. To 
reassure these, the President announced in 19 13 that "the 
United States will never again seek one additional foot 
of territory by conquest." And he insisted that Mexico 
must be allowed to solve her own problems without inter- 
ference. In 1 91 4 and again in 19 16 there were invasions of 
Mex'ico by the United States, but only for the purpose of 
protection; and the troops concerned were soon withdrawn. 
This course gave a new appearance to the famous Monroe 
Doctrine (see page 261), and indicated that the United 
States would not claim for itself things that it forbade Eu- 
pean countries to try to do. It meant that the American 
republics were safe from conquest. 



THE PANAMA CANAL 



481 



442. The Panama Canal and the Exposition. The ai> 
proaching completion of the Panama Canal gave new im- 
portance to the relations between the United States and its 
neighbors. President Wilson insisted that the canal must 

be opened on equal 

terms to all. In 
1 9 14 it was an- 
nounced that the 
great locks were 
done, the cuts were 
dug, and on August 
15 the canal was 
to be opened to the 
world. In celebra- 
tion of this a great 
world's fair was 
held in San Fran- 
cisco, in 191 5, and 
the President prom- 
ised to go himself, 
and to let the pro- 
cession of battleships be headed by the old Oregon whose 
gallant voyage around South America in 1898 had shown 
the real need of the canal. But he could not keep the prom- 
ise, for before 1914 was over the prosperity, the ideals, and 
even the existence of our country were at stake. 




THE GATUN LOCKS, PANAMA CANAL 

By means of a system of great locks the largest ships are raised 
or lowered over the hills of the Isthmus. The ships are drawn 
through the locks by electric locomotives that run on tracks 
along the side of the locks. 



QUESTIONS AND SUGGESTIONS 

1. Why is a federal reserve banknote a secure form of money? Com- 
pare with a silver certificate. 

2. Make a list of five trusts. 

3. Has your State an income tax? What amounts of income are exempt 
under the United States income tax? 

COMPOSITION SUBJECTS 

1. Write a letter telling of your visit to Washington, D.C. 

2. Describe a trip to the San Francisco Exposition. 

3. Describe a trip in a submarine; in an airplane. 

4. Do you think women ought to be allowed to vote? Why? 



CHAPTER XLIX 

Wilson's administration: the world war: the Euro- 
pean SYSTEM AND OURS: PROBLEMS OF NEUTRALITY: 
GERMAN INTRIGUE 

443. The European system and ours. The growth of the 
United States in weahh, and its peaceful relations' with all 
the world, made a sharp contrast with affairs in Europe 
where nations were constantly on their guard against each 
other. After the wars in which Napoleon tried to conquer 
Europe, ending in his defeat at Waterloo in 1815, various 
nations kept great armies constantly ready for defense or 
attack. England, on an island, and with her "wooden 
walls" around her, had not done this, nor had the little 
nations. Belgium, indeed, and Luxemburg, were promised 
by solemn treaties that they should not be attacked. But 
the great powers maintained large armies, and even 
adopted the principle of compulsory military training. 
They forced every man to spend a certain time in the army, 
and then, when his service was done to go into the reserve, 
subject to be called back into active ser\dce if needed. 

444. Prussia. There was a long peace after Napoleon's 
downfall, and western Europe saw no great war until 1864. 
Then Prussia and Austria robbed Denmark of her rich 
provinces of Schleswig and Holstein, and in 1866 Prussia 
took from Austria the spoils of this earlier attack. In 1870 
the rivalry of Germany and France produced an attack by 
Prussia under her great builder Bismarck, with the result 
that Alsace and Lorraine were torn from France. There- 
after France kept her armies for protection, and in the hope 
of regaining her lost provinces. Prussia, organizing the Ger- 
man Empire about herself, made war her glory and am- 
bition her desire. In the race for leadership among nations, 
fear of Prussia and ambition in Prussia were the leading 



PRUSSIAN AMBITION 483 

motives. There were no unarmed borders like those of the 
United States. 

445. " Der Tag." The professional soldiers of Germany 
looked to the day when Germany should rule Europe, if not 
the whole world. They allied themselves with Italy and 
Austria for the former purpose; the British navy stood 
between them and the latter. And so the young Kaiser 
William II, who began his rule in 1888, dug a canal from 
Kiel on the Baltic to the North Sea, and built a great 
modern navy to use it; while the officers in his army and 
on his ships drank toasts to "Der Tag" — the day — when 
they should meet England and sweep away her strength. 
No country in the world lacked some imperialists, — men 
who wanted to gain national power at the expense of weak 
and inoffensive neighbors, — but only Germany allowed 
them to rule unchecked. The threat of possible war hung 
low over Europe after 1900. Once or twice it seemed as if 
it must fall. But the " dreadnaught " battleships, first built 
in 1905, were so large that the Kiel Canal had to be en- 
larged to carry them, and until this was done Germany 
could not afford to go to war. 

446. The attack on Servia. The new Kiel Canal was 
opened July i, 1914. Three days earlier the assassination of 
the heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne gave a pretext 
for a war. A Servian had done the murder. Servia stood 
in the road of Austria. On July 5 there seems to have 
been a conference in Potsdam, at which Germany and 
Austria agreed that "Der Tag" had come. On July 28 
Austria started war on Servia, Russia came to the de- 
fense of Servda at once, and Germany invaded Belgium 
and France to prevent France from aiding Russia. The 
invasion of Belgium, in spite of the solemn agreement that 
she should be left neutral, brought England into the war. 
The flames of warfare that had smouldered for a genera- 
tion broke into wild conflagration.^ 

1 Germany and her allies, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, and Turkey, be- 
came known as the Central Powers, because of their location in central Eu- 



484 THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER 



447. Neutrality. The United States looked on aghast. 
Every nation in the war had sent of its sons to America, and 
these naturally hoped and believed that the fatherland or 
motherland was right. President Wilson proclaimed at 
once that the United' States would remain neutral in the 
war, and allowed American ministers abroad to do friendly 
services for all the countries. Few dreamed that it could 
affect the United States or that the war was really a be- 
ginning of a test of strength between autocratic monarchies 
and the principle of free government, under which the 
people rule. 

448. Belgium. But as the news from Belgium reached 
America, people began to see that the nation responsible 

for what was happening there could 
not possi'bly be right. Belgium was 
attacked in cold blood, in spite of 
treaties written for the special purpose 
of defending her, and signed by Ger- 
many. Old men and women were shot 
in the streets of the Belgian towns. 
Children were murdered. Houses were 
burned. Able-bodied men and women 
were carried away into slavery in Ger- 
many. And the unoffending Belgians 
would have starved had not Ameri- 
cans, led by Herbert C. Hoover, formed 
a society to raise money and to feed 
the starving. As Americans saw these things a wide opinion 
formed that Germany had produced the war, and her con- 
duct was a danger to the world. The Government re- 
mained neutral, but private opinion made up its own mind. 

rope. Great Britain, Russia, and France were the Allies, or the Entente Allies. 
Entente is a French word meaning understanding; there had been an under- 
standing or informal agreement aniong these countries as to how they should 
protect themselves if Germany declared war. They were joined in 1914 by 
Belgium, Serbia, Montenegro, and Japan: in IQ15 by Italy and San Marino; 
in 1916 by Portugal and Roumania; in 1917 by Bolivia, Brazil, China, Cuba, 
Greece, Liberia, Panama, Siam, and the United States; in 1918 by Guatemala, 
Haiti, Nicaragua, and Honduras. 




Copyright by Harris and Ewing 

HERBERT C. HOOVER 

Who organized the relief of Hel- 
gium and then returned to ad- 
minister and save our food. 



THE LESSON OF BELGIUM 485 

449. The future of peace. American opinion was horri- 
fied at the sufferings of little Belgium, and admired the 
courage with which it refused to yield to the invader, and 
by its resistance gave England and P>ance time to form 
their lines and save Paris. But behind it all was the ques- 
tion, — Belgium had been guarded by a general treaty, 
and the treaty had failed to save her: could the United 
States or any other peaceful nation continue to rely on 
promises and good will? In the first year of the war ex- 
President Taft, and James Bryce, and other distinguished 
leaders of England and America worked out a scheme for a 
league of nations to enforce peace and to prevent another 
war from following this one. Convictions deepened in 
Great Britain and France that this war must be the last, 
and that never again must it be possible for a warlike and 
unscrupulous nation to pick its time and try to rob its 
neighbors. People began at last to read what German 
writers had been discussing for many years about German 
conquest and expansion, the scheme for "Central Europe," 
and the railroad from Berlin to Bagdad. 

450. American defense. The more Americans directed 
their thoughts to the lesson of Belgium the more clearly 
they saw that tjie United States was running a great risk 
on the chance of peace. There were no forces to be relied 
upon in case America should be invaded. If the navy 
should be overpowered by an enemy there were some forts 
along the coasts, but these were not greater than those that 
Germany had destroyed in her attack upon Belgium. There 
was a small regular army, brave and well organized, but 
not large enough to defend even a single Atlantic seaport. 
The militia of the States was not uniformly efficient. And 
the new war was so gigantic that few could say how and 
where the United States must begin in order to prepare. 
"Preparedness" became a subject of discussion in 19 14 and 
increased in interest as every few months revealed a new 
horror of the war. 

451. Machinery of modern war. New tools and new 



THE SUBMARLNES 487 

methods were used from the start. Great cannon, of which 
the rest of Europe had been unaware, were brought out 
by Germany to blow to fragments the steel and concrete 
forts of Belgium and France. Airplanes flew over the line 
of battle to inspect the enemy's country, to drop bombs, and 
to shoot with machine guns. Machine guns seemed to be 
more numerous than rifles. Instead of fighting in the open, 
both armies dug deep trenches from which they fought. 
In April, 1915, the German army sprung a complete surprise 
by letting loose a wave of poison gas (chlorine) to stifle the 
English, and gas warfare became a new terror. The next 
summer the British invented the "tank," a heavily armored 
motor-car, that could advance over trenches and through 
walls and houses, and that cut to pieces the barbed wire 
network with which the trenches were guarded. The war 
was one of machinery and inventors; with a magnitude 
beyond anything Americans could yet conceive. 

452. The submarine as a weapon. The airplane and the 
submarine were the most striking of the new weapons. In 
September, 19 14, a German submarine destroyed with tor- 
pedoes three British cruisers on one day, and raised the 
question of the value of certain types of modern ships. The 
German navy had mostly remained at home in safety, leav- 
ing the British fleet in control of the oceans. But von 
Tirpitz, head of the German, navy, was determined to use 
the submarine to terrorize Great Britain if he could, and 
in February, 191 5, it was announced that British merchant- 
men would be sunk in the waters around the British Isles. 

453. Blockades and neutrals. The United States and the 
other neutral countries had of course been incon^'enienced 
by the Great War. Their commerce had been interfered 
with. Each of the warring powers tried to stop supplies 
to its enemy, and neutrals suffered. The law of nations per- 
mits neutrals to trade with countries at war, but allows 
the fighting nations— the belligerents — (i) to stop contra- 
band of war, such as weapons, ammunition, and materials 
for making them, bound for the enemy, (2) to search 



488 THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER 

neutral vessels to see If they are carrying aid to the enemy, 
and (3) to declare a blockade of the enemy coast and seize 
any vessel trying to pass through the blockade. The block- 
ade must be real and thorough, such as the United States 
stretched around the Confederacy, but all powers recognize 
its legality. Since Great Britain kept the German fleet at 
home, it was England, and only England that interfered 
with neutral trade. Often we felt that the interference was 
unfair, but the search and seizures were carried on with 
directness and care, no lives were lost, and all claims for 
unjust treatment were given prompt attention. What 
grievances there were because the Allies' practice of the 

laws of war were 
inconvenient, were 
soon silenced by the 
great outrage in- 
flicted by Germany. 
454. The Lusi- 
tania. The German 
submarine blockade 
of England began 
in February, 191 5. 
President W^ilson 
protested against it immediately, calling attention to the 
fact that no submarine could lawfully observe the laws of 
war. It could not safeguard the lives of passengers on mer- 
chant ships, it could not carry out the search, it could 
not spare prize crews to take captured vessels to port. He 
warned Germany that she would be held to "strict account- 
ability" if any lives were taken as result of this new variety 
of naval w^arfare. On May 7 the German threat was car- 
ried out in all completeness. The great liner Lusitania, 
one of the fastest and finest ships afloat, was torpedoed and 
sunk without warning while on a voyage from the United 
States to England, and more than a thousand innocent 
men, women, and children were drowned. Among these 
were 114 American citizens whose lives were thus taken by 




THE LUSITANIA 



PREPAREDNESS 4«9 

Germany, which was professing to be at peace with the 
United States, and whose subjects, by milHons, had sought 
in America a happiness and prosperity denied them at 
home. A wave of horror swept around the world, and most 
real Americans who had not been convinced upon the 
merits of the war by the destruction of Belgium, now saw 
Germany in a new and ghastly light. 

455. Preparedness. The indignant protest against the 
murder of the Americans on the Lusitania was met with 
falsehood and evasion. First it was falsely asserted that 
the Lusitania was secretly armed ; then it was claimed that 
Germany had a right to retaliate upon England even though 
retaliation involved the rights and lives of neutrals. To 
all of this the President replied with the demand that 
such conduct cease; he began to see, as his country began to 
see, that the war had become universal and that upon its 
outcome depended the future of the world. There was just 
a chance that Germany would check her course short of 
forcing the United States to war. But in order to be ready 
for what might come, on the day that the last note was 
written about the Lusitania President Wilson called upon 
his secretaries of war and the navy for advice upon pre- 
paredness. It was not to be moderate preparedness but 
complete ; the kind of preparedness that would permit the 
country if it must, to bring its whole power into the war for 
its defense. 

456. The navy stands ready. The navy, always the first 
line of American defense, was ready for action. It is im- 
possible to build warships quickly, and therefore the naval 
strength of a country cannot be greatly increased after the 
outbreak of a war, unless the war is prolonged. Our navy 
had been watched and loved even in time of peace. The 
voyage around the world (see p. 458) had shown the skill of 
its officers and men, and many new battleships had been 
added since 1909. Admiral Dewey, who had been its chief 
officer since his promotion after the battle of Manila Bay, 
assured the people that the navy was ready for instant serv- 



490 THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER 

ice. Under wise administration it had become a training- 
school for character, and its enHsted men were more numer- 
ous than ever before. In 191 5 Congress created the new 
office of Chief of Naval Operations to make it easier to use 
the navy as a fighting machine. The next summer, as a result 
of the President's demand for great preparedness, the largest 
single appropriation ever made was voted by Congress for 
new ships and equipment. The President was resolved 
to keep the peace if he could, but to be ready if war must 
come. 

457. The National Defense Act. The navy required only 
an increase of men and ships ; the army called for complete 
change of method and organization. In every earlier war we 
had relied chiefly upon volunteer soldiers, and we had never 
learned that it would be impossible to meet a real enemy 
with these, for never had we faced a modern, well-organized 
enemy. In.the Civil War both sides lost two years in training 
men and leaders; in the Spanish W'^a.r we tried to raise an 
army quickly, only to see men die by thousands of unneces- 
sary disease because their officers did not know how to 
protect them. Since the Spanish W^ar much had been learned. 
The medical corps had learned how to prevent yellow fever. 
Typhoid fever, malaria, and diphtheria had ceased to be 
dangerous, if properly watched. In Roosevelt's administra- 
tion a General Staff had been created to direct the army, and 
to make plans for its development. In 191 6, under the pres- 
sure for preparedness the National Defense Act was passed, 
carrying an increase in the regular army, a new arrangement 
for the militia, or national guard, and, most important, a 
provision for training young officers. It takes fifty thousand 
officers to command a million men; to train these a system 
of camps and a course of study were provided; the evils 
resulting from untrained volunteer officers were to be avoided 
in the next war, and professional soldiers were to direct the 
work. 

458. Intrigue and sedition. Germany watched with fear 
the change in American opinion, the growing hostility 



INTRIGUE AND SEDITION 491 

among the American people, and the new wilhngness to 
make sacrifices for a real preparedness. For many years she 
had believed that the millions of former Germans in the 
United States would prevent any interference with her plans 
from us. She had encouraged such organizations as the 
German-American National Alliance to keep up the use 
of the German language, and their leaders to talk about the 
virtues of German kidtiir. Upon the outbreak of the war 
her agents in America began to hire men to blow up bridges 
in Canada, to destroy factories in America making guns 
and ammunition, and to incite workmen to strike In such 
factories. These things were proved in courts of law. 

459. Mexico. It was also whispered that Germans In 
America would be armed to raise revolt if the United 
States Interfered. In Mexico she tried to spread distrust 
of the United States; so also In South America. Her am- 
bassador in Washington, Count von Bernstorff, talked of 
using money to influence Congress Itself. Many of the 
citizens whom she used for these criminal purposes were 
only Ignorant; a few were willing to turn traitor to the 
land that had held open to them the door of opportunity. 
During 191 5 and 191 6 Intrigue and sedition ran high 
among "hyphenated" Americans — those whose love was 
for another country than their own. 

460. Villa on the border. In the midst of all the great 
preparations for defense, Mexico continued in a state of 
revolution. Huerta had been driven out of power in 1914; 
after him Carranza gained the power, and Villa contested 
for it. Damage and destruction of American lives and 
property continued. German intrigue among Mexicans 
and other Spanish-Americans had spread so much distrust 
of the United States that an attempt to help Mexico might 
have been regarded as the beginning of conquest. So Presi- 
dent Wilson continued his policy of patient self-restraint, 
or "watchful waiting" hoping that Mexico would save 
herself. In the spring of 1916 he sent an army into north- 
ern Mexico to suppress the bandit Villa, but brought it 



492 THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER 

back home the following winter. All the time Germany is 
now known to have been conspiring to provoke war there, 
either to tie the hands of the United States or to arouse 
suspicion of American motives. Early in 191 7 she offered 
to help Mexico conquer Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona 
in the event of war. 

461. The Sussex. While President Wilson was watch- 
fully waiting for peace in Mexico, he was patiently hoping 
that Germany would refrain from forcing us to war. After 
sinking of the Lusitania, the submarines avoided the 
drowning of Americans, and in the fall of 191 5 there was 
room for hope that the wiser counsels would prevail. 
But in 19 1 6 the Sussex was sunk without warning in the 
English Channel, and the President declared at once that 
unless Germany pledged herself to stop this sort of murder 
he would break off all relations with her. Germany did not 
believe the United States would or could fight, and still 
relied upon hyphenated Americans to keep us helpless, 
but she gave the pledge, and for a few more months peace 
remained possible. But the plans for preparedness continued 
during 191 6, and on the very day of the Sussex ultimatum 
the United States seized the papers of a German spy, 
von Igel, which proved the nature of her secret conspiracy 
to tie our hands. 

462. The reelection of Wilson. American opinion had 
supported the President in his efforts to maintain our 
neutrality, and had gradually awakened to the need for 
preparedness while still holding to the hope that war might 
be avoided. Business, which had suffered greatly in the 
first year of the war, improved in 191 5, and there was 
no desire among the Democrats to select any other can- 
didate in the election than President Wilson. He had 
"kept us out of war," and they believed that if possible 
he would continue to do so. He had also sternly resisted 
every call for a war with Mexico. The Republicans tried to 
heal the breach with the Progressives. Judge Charles 
Evans Hughes became their candidate upon a platform of 



UNDILUTED AMERICANISM 



493 



complete preparedness and "undiluted Americanism." ^ But 
in the canvass he was greatly weakened by receiving the 
support of the organized hyphenated German-Americans, 
who did not care for him, but who wanted to punish Presi- 
dent Wilson for his refusal to grant special favors to Ger- 
many. The election was close, but when the votes were 
counted it was seen that 
Mr. Wilson had been re- 
elected because of the strong 
support which the plain 
people of the West gave to 
his policies. He failed to 
carry the great States of 
New York, Pennsylvania, 
Indiana, and Illinois, yet re- 
ceived both popular and 
electoral majorities. The 
center of population had 
shifted in one hundred and 
twenty years, from near 
Baltimore to the vicinity 
of Indianapolis. It seemed 
from this election as if the 
center of political influence 
had shifted as well. Here in 
the Middle West there were 

fewer huge cities than in the East, and fewer groups of 
unassimilated foreigners. The fundamentals of American- 
ism were here most widely prevalent, and now they asserted 

1 Charles Evans Hughes was born in New York in 1862, and first came to 
be well known in 1905 as counsel in the New York insurance investigation, 
where he showed strength of character and skill in extracting the truth about 
the mismanagement of the insurance companies. He was elected governor of 
New Y'ork in 1906 and again in 1908, after having been suggested for the 
Presidency of the United States in 1908. In 1910 President Taft appointed 
him associate justice of the Supreme Court, which position he resigned 
June 10, 1916, the day he was nominated for the Presidency. After his defeat 
in November he returned to the practice of law in New York. In May, 1918, 
at the request of President Wilson he undertook an investigation of the charges 
of mismanagement in the production of airplanes for the army. 




Photograph bij Paul Thompson 

RHEIMS CATHEDRAL 

One of the glories of Gothic art until the Germans 
deliberately bombarded it 



494 THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER 



themselves in the national crisis, speaking for peace, if pos- 
sible, but for a peace without hyphenated interference. 

463. The program of peace. Once reelected President 
Wilson took steps to end the period of uncertainty. In 
December he called upon all the nations at war to state 
their aims, so that the neutral world might know which 

of them were fighting for 
worthy purposes. The Al- 
lies replied with definite 
statements, but Germany 
and her associates, — the 
Central Powers, Austria- 
Hungary, Turkey, and Bul- 
garia, — were unwilling to 
disclose their aims. In Jan- 
uary the President an- 
nounced that the United 
States was ready to enter 
into a league to maintain 
the peace, and to extend 
to innocent nations in all 
the world the same guaran- 
tees that the Monroe Doc- 
trine had long preserved in 
America, and that recently 
the United States had observed in the case of Mexico. It 
was becoming clear that the peace which the United States 
longed for could not be obtained without fighting for it. 

464. German defiance. The military autocracy in Ger- 
many that had provoked the war for its own purposes, and 
that foresaw a revolution against the Hohenzollerns should 
it not win the war, took no warning from the events in the 
United States. On February i, 191 7, it started a policy 
of sinking, without warning, merchant ships of whatever 
nationality, in the waters around England; and continued 
to defend its submarine piracy on the ground of "military 
necessity" and retaliation. This was a repudiation of the 




Photograph by Paul Thompson 

WITHIN RHEIMS CATHEDRAL 

After bombardment 



GERMAN DEFIANCE 495 

pledge given after the Sussex case, and when it was an- 
nounced President Wilson at once dismissed the German 
ambassador, von Bernstorff , and met Congress to tell it of his 
course. A wave of patriotic devotion spread across the 
country, with only here and there an unimportant obstruc- 
tion, for the patience and moderation of the American 
Government had given the people time to realize the issues 
at stake. Even among the former Germans and Austrians, 
with whom Germany had tried to conspire, the spirit was 
generally one of unity and loyalty.^ 

QUESTIONS AND SUGGESTIONS 

1. Why did Washington wish to avoid "entangUng alliances" ? 

2. What were the Hague Conferences? 

3. How did your State vote in 1916? 

4. In what ways has the European War affected the United States? 

COMPOSITION SUBJECTS 

1. Why should the United States join a league of nations to enforce 
peace? 

2. How were the ideas of neutrality involved in the years 1793-18 12? 

3. Compare our blockade of the Confederacy with the German block- 
ade of England. 

4. Why does it take less trouble to get a navy into action in a war than 
an army? 

1 While our relations with Germany were thus becoming more and more 
strained, the purchase (March, 1917) of the Danish West Indies greatly 
strengthened our strategic position in the Caribbean Sea. These islands are of 
negligible value for their own products, and are wholly dependent upon the 
United States for a market, and for their imports. But the>- command the 
trade routes from Europe to the Panama Canal, and can easily be fortified. 
The United States has twice previously endeavored to purchase these islands. 
In 1865 a proposition of Secretary Seward, whereby we were to acquire the 
islands for $7,500,000, failed of ratification by the Senate; in 1902, Secretary 
Hay concluded a treaty by which the islands were to become ours upon pay- 
ment of $5,000,000. German influence is said to have defeated this treaty in 
the Danish upper house. The third effort proved successful, the price paid 
being $25,000,000. By wish of the islanders, the ancient name "Virgin Islands" 
was restored. 



CHAPTER L 

Wilson's administration: "a world safe for 
democracy": the united states at war 

465. War against Germany. Between February and 
April, 191 7, the United States waited in hope that even 
at the last Germany might remove the necessity for war. 
Instead of this she torpedoed more ships and intrigued 
in Mexico. On April 2 the new Congress met in special 
session to hear the President speak for war : — 

"We have no quarrel with the German people," he said. "It 
was not upon their impulse that their Government acted in 
entering the war. ... It was a war determined upon as wars used 
to be determined in the old unhappy days when peoples were 
nowhere consulted by their rulers, and wars were provoked and 
waged in the interests of dynasties or of little groups of ambi- 
tious men who were accustomed to use their fellow men as pawns 
and tools. . . . We have borne with their present Government 
through all these bitter months because of that friendship (for 
the people of Germany), exercising a patience and forbearance 
which would otherwise have been impossible." 

Four days later Congress passed a declaration that a state 
of war existed with Germany, and pledged all the resources 
of the country "to bring the conflict to a successful termi- 
nation." 

466. The destroyers at work. In less than a month 
after the declaration of war the navy was carrying a share 
of its new burdens. Admiral Sims, with a fleet of swift 
destroyers, was sent to the British coast to help keep up 
the tight blockade of Germany that the sturdy British fleet 
had maintained for nearly three years, and to help keep the 
ocean pathways clear of submarines and floating mines. 
Other detachments followed him from time to time. And 



THE APPEAL OF JOFFRE 



497 



at home the shipyards were soon building ships in great 
numbers to replace those sunk by the submarines. 

467. The appeal of Joffre. England and France still 
held the line unbroken on the Western Front from Switz- 
erland to the North Sea. Italy stood guard along the Alps. 
Russia still stood firm 
along the East. All 
were resolute, but all 
were weary with the 
labor of withstanding the 
pressure of Germany's 
military machine. They 
had suspended their 
civil life, and convert- 
ed themselves and their 
factories to war, in 
order that they might 
remain free peoples. 
They welcomed the en- 
try of a strong new 
nation, and from Brit- 
ain and France came 
groups of statesmen 
and generals to greet 
the new ally. The 
French mission in- 
cluded Marshal Joffre, 
hero of the Marne, and 

sa^•ior of France. His visit recalled the earlier crusade of 
Lafayette, who in the Revolution had given generously 
of French courage to our cause of freedom. He stirred the 
soul of America by his simple eloquence, and when he 
called for troops to help keep the line in France, the troops 
were found. 

468. Pershing in France. On June 26, 191 7, the first 
American division landed in France. Their commander, 
General John J. Pershing, had preceded them by a few 




Copyri'jht by Harris and Swing 

ADMIRAL SIMS 

Whose fleet was on duty in European waters in less than 
a month after war was declared 



498 THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER 



days, and on the Fourth of July some of them were marched 
through the streets of Paris, as a visible sign that the de- 
mocracy of the West was paying its debt to freedom and 
its first ally. At the tomb of Lafayette Pershing made a 
simple speech: "The Americans have come." 

469. Men. No method of recruiting ever practiced in the 
past in the United States would have provided enough men 

for this war. In modern 
warfare the whole na- 
tion is at work, each 
person where his serv- 
ices are needed most. 
In our earlier wars, in 
which smaller armies 
and less machinery were 
used, volunteering was 
our chief method of rais- 
ing troops. But volun- 
teering is defective be- 
cause the gallant men 
who offer themselves 
first are not always those 
who can best be spared 
from the ranks of in- 
dustry. On April 6, 
1 91 7, there were in our 
military service about 
289,000 men (regular 
army, 127,000; national 
guard, 80,000 ; navy and 
marines, 82,000). By voluntary enlistment this total was 
raised to more than 1,500,000 within a year. To add to this 
number, Congress passed on May 18, 1917, a selective serv- 
ice or draft act holding all men between twenty-one and 
thirty-one years of age liable to service if needed. A few days 
later 9,659,382 young men registered under this act, and in 
1 91 8 there were 750,000 more old enough to be added to the 




Copt/right by Sairis and Ewing 

GENERAL PERSHING 

In command of the American Expeditionary Force, whose 
first units landed in France June 26, 1917 



TO WIN THE WAR 499 

list. These men were classified according to their health, 
their family responsibilities, and their business; and from 
their number more than a million had been drafted into the 
national army by the following summer. iib^^^^^^^^^^ 

Before the Fourth of July, 191 8, more '^^^^^ i^^^^^^^^^^^^^ 

than a million American soldiers were ac- yr 

tually in France, or aboard ships going I J" 

thither. ||||| * 

470. Labor. Men in overalls as well as 
men in uniforms were needed to win the i 
war. Since 1908 the Democrats had had the service flag 

the support of many of the most promi- Each star represents a per- 
r^t^ _7 ^ I ^ son in war service 

nent labor leaders because it was believed 
that the Republicans were unfriendly to labor organization. 
The American Federation of Labor came out in loyal sup- 
port of President Wilson and the war as soon as it was 
declared, and adopted a policy of avoiding strikes wherever 
it was possible, in order to prevent the curtailment of 
production. It was recognized that whoever interfered with 
industry, whether by asking too high a wage or by refusing 
to pay a fair wage, whether as workman or as employer, 
was giving direct aid to Germany. 

471. National labor policy. In 191 8, after long confer- 
ences between the labor organizations and the associations of 
employers, the National War Labor Board was constituted, 
with ex-President Taft as its head, assisted by a labor 
advocate, Frank Walsh. This board took a broad view of 
the needs of labor, not only for a "living wage," but for a 
"comfort wage." It settled large numbers of disputes, 
many of which were caused by sudden increases in the cost 
of living that were not met by suitable wage increases. Its 
work was made easier because the United States had taken 
over the administration of the railroads and telegraphs as 
a war measure, and was itself operating many munitions 
factories. Some varieties of industrial work were regarded 
as quite as useful as service in the army. Men at work in 
ship-building, for example, were exempt from the draft. 



500 THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER 

472. Money. Money, too, was needed in this new cru- 
sade in greater amounts than ever before. Congress author- 
ized a series of "Liberty Loans" through which the Gov- 
ernment borrowed about $12,000,000,000 in the first year 
of war. War savings stamps added to this amount. A 
great new tax bill, passed in October, raised $3,672,000,000 
more, spreading much of the cost of the war upon large 
incomes or upon the excess profits of those who were 
making fortunes out of wartime manufactures. No other 
country has ever lived so well as the American people, and 
when the time came for sacrifice it was found that they 
could cheerfully pay heavy taxes, subscribe to tremendous 
loans, and still have money to give in huge amounts to the 
Red Cross, the Young Men's Christian Association, the 
Knights of Columbus, and other agencies that were formed 
to care for the soldier sons and brothers of those citizens 
who could not themselves go to war. 

473. Food. All of the Allies were in need of food. Most of 
them, in ordinary times, had to import some of their food 
from other countries. Now with their young men in the 
armies they needed to buy still more; but the German sub- 
marines, lying in wait to torpedo cargo ships, destroyed 
much and hoped to destroy more until they might starve 
the Allies into submission. "Food will win the War" was 
the cry of the Government, and patriotic citizens set out to 
save food, — wheat, meat, sugar, and fats, — so that we 
might have not only enough for ourselves but enough to 
feed our Allies. A new branch of the Government was 
hurriedly formed to direct the saving of food and fuel, and 
to keep selfish "profiteers" from charging too much for the 
necessities of life. W^hile our soldiers were drilling in their 
camps the ships were carrying cargoes of food to England, 
Italy, and France. 

474. Ships. But there were not enough ships for the work, 
and what there were were decreasing as the submarines 
took their toll of boats and lives. A new Shipping Board 
was created to build more ships, and for a time its work 



BUILDING THE SHIPS 501 

was directed by the great engineer who had just dug the 
Panama Canal, Major-General George W. Goethals. Many 
new shipyards were opened, and existing yards were in- 
creased in size. The navy was hurrying to make hundreds 
of destroyers to watch for submarines, and merchant ships 
were constructed wherever there was room to build and 
men to work. Four kinds of ships were made, (i) Wooden 
ships of the sort that had made the Yankee skippers 
famous at the beginning of the last century were launched 
in shipyards that had not heard the 
hammer for half a century. (2) Steel 
ships were riveted together from plates 
that kept busy the rolling mills at 
Pittsburg and the Lakes. (3) Fabri- 
cated ships were made of steel, but 
were made in sections, partly finished 
at the interior mills and finally assem- 
bled at the shipyards. And (4) con- 
crete ships were tried as an experiment, ^ , „ . , „ . 

'^ . , . , Copyright by Harris and Ewing 

found seaworthy, and built m numbers. general goethals 
In the summer of 191 8 the shipping who buiu the panamk canai 
program showed results, with several 

ships a day sliding into the water, and finished vessels 
launched in places where a year before there had been 
only open meadows. More than ninety new ships were 
launched on the Fourth of July, 1918. 

475. From cantonments to the base in France. Once we 
became convinced that we must fight for peace and freedom 
all sides of life were shaped to win the war. In the summer 
of 191 7 great camps, or cantonments, were built to house 
over half a million men. Beginning in September the 
drafted men were called to camp, uniformed, drilled, formed 
into regiments and divisions; and, as rapidly as ships were 
ready, were sent to France. The ports from which they 
sailed, and those at which they landed, were not revealed, 
lest the Germans should learn about their movements. But 
at ports "somewhere in France" the army built great har- 




502 THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER 

bors and docks, warehouses and hospitals, and a railway 
nearly five hundred miles in length, so that our army might 
help itself without being a drain upon the strength and re- 
sources of France. In France there were new cantonments 
and training-schools where the soldiers received their last 
instructions. Before Christmas many of the troops were 
standing in the front trenches by the side of comrades who 
had held back the Germans for three and a quarter years. 

476. Russia: delivered and betrayed. There was need 
for the American troops by the end of 191 7, for one of the 
original Allies, whose deliverance from autocracy had been 
welcomed, had been betrayed by civil war into the hands of 
Germany. Russia stood up under the stress of attack upon 
the Eastern Front for three years, but at the outbreak of 
war she had been impoverished by the costly and dishonest 
Government of the Czars; and as the war and losses pro- 
gressed revolt had come. In March, 191 7, a revolution de- 
throned the Czar Nicholas II, and the Provisional Govern- 
ment proclaimed its determination to stand by its allies; 
but abandoned the selfish national aims which the former 
Government had exacted. Once started, the forces of re- 
volt passed beyond the power of the moderate men. Ke- 
rensky struggled in vain to keep the Government under 
control. In November the revolutionist Socialists, who 
called themselves Bolsheviki, overturned him, cast out all 
persons of property from a share in the Government, and 
in a few weeks began a negotiation with Germany for a 
separate peace. Germany professed to negotiate peace 
with them, but really robbed the defenseless Bolsheviki 
and the Russia that they had betrayed. She took from them 
Poland, the Baltic Provinces, Finland, and Ukraine; trying 
to leave Russia prostrate and unable even to resist. The 
troops that she needed no longer on the Eastern Front Ger- 
many sent west for another great attempt to break through 
the line into the heart of France. 

477. The appeal to democracy. All through the war the 
German Government told its subjects that it was fighting 



THE 
EASTKKN FItONT 



Knilwnys 
TV Forts 
— January 1918 
■"• Farthest advance of the 
Russians 




504 THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER 

in self defense against the Allies. Before bringing the full 
force of the United States into the field President Wilson 
tried once more to show the German people that safety 
for free government was our single purpose. He assured 
them that the United States was not fighting to tear Austria 




to pieces, or to destroy Germany, but to establish a world 
in which they and all honorable nations might hope for 
freedom and safety. He warned them against the course 
taken by their autocratic leaders. But when there came 
from Germany and Austria no sign of protest against their 
rulers, he proclaimed against them, "Force! Force to the 
uttermost!" and hurried still more troops to France. 

478. The German drive of 1918. All through the winter 
of 191 7 Germany strengthened her forces on the Western 
Front in the hope of beating the Allies before our men could 
arrive in large numbers. It told its people that America 
would not fight, but it hastened to end the war in 1918. 
On March 21 the drive began, in the direction of Paris and 
against the point in the line where the British and French 
armies met. For weeks the line swayed back and forth; 



ALLIED UNITY OF COMMAND 



505 



but it did not break. To us the call came to send the men 
at once, for this was the year that might decide the future 
of the world. And the camps were emptied to meet the call, 
and more men were drafted to fill the places left vacant in 




our camps, and President Wilson promised that we would 
continue to send men and food in increasing amounts until 
they should add enough weight to the line to drive the 
Germans back across the Rhine. 

479. Pershing, Foch, and the single front. There had 
been some American troops in the trenches for several 



5o6 THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER 

months before the drive began. Once It was started, 
General Pershing offered all his force to be used where most 
needed, by itself or in connection with either the British or 
the French. Out of this came a great change that encour- 
aged all the Allies. It was agreed that a single general, or 
"generalissimo," should command all the troops on the 
Western Front, whatever their nationality. General Foch, 
who with Marshal Joffre had saved France in 1914, was 
appointed to the new united command, and the Americans 
were used all along the line. The blow in March failed to 
get through. In April the Germans struck at the British 
in Flanders, and were stopped again. In May they struck 
again at Paris, pushed through between the glorious cathe- 
dral town of Rheims, and Soissons, and with the head of 
their force touched the river Marne. And there they 
found, standing between them and their goal a stubborn line 
of American troops who helped to turn them back. 

480. The War Cabinet. The united command of the 
Allied armies under Marshal Foch was the beginning of 
new vigor and unity for the Allies. In the next few months 
all of their wealth and resources as well as their soldiers 
were placed in one common "pool," to be used as needed 
for the common cause. At Versailles, near Paris, their Su- 
preme W^ar Council directed and supported the main cam- 
paigns of Foch, Haig, and Pershing. To assist it other 
councils were created to divide and share food, money, 
munitions, and ships. At home. President Wilson began 
to hold frequent meetings with a group of ad\isers outside 
his regular Cabinet, who became popularly known as his 
" War Cabinet." This group Included the chairmen of the 
War Trade Board (McCormick), W'ar Industries Board 
(Baruch), and Shipping Board (Hurley), and the directors 
of the Food Administration (Hoover), Fuel Administration 
(Garfield), and Railroad Administration (McAdoo). 

481. Chateau Thierry and the Marne. On July 15, 1918, 
the German armies attacked again along the Marne River, 
hoping still to capture Paris. This time Marshal Foch had 



WHAT WE ARE FIGHTING FOR 507 

learned in ad\ance where the blow was to he struck, and 
had prepared for it. lie made a counter-attack on July 18, 
using American divisions near Chateau Thierry, where the 
first and second divisions had fought so well in June. Here 
was the turning-point of the war. Slowly but irresistibly 
the French and Americans drove the Germans back, be- 
tween Soissons and Rheims, until by early August they 
were on a steady retreat. For a second time the enemy had 
reached the Marne, in vain. 

482. Saint-Mihiel and the Argonne. There was new 
confidence among the Allies in August, 191 8. The " bridge 
of ships " was now pouring " Yanks " into France (244,000 
in May, 277,000 in June, 306,000 in July); and at Wash- 
ington it was decided to place eighty divisions — nearly 
4,000,000 men — ^ on the line in the summer of 1919. The 
draft age (see par. 469) was extended, bringing in all men be- 
tween eighteen and forty-five. The troops already overseas 
were finishing their training periods. In September General 
Pershing conducted an American attack agai^ t the sal- 
ient at Saint-Mihiel, as a preliminary to a larg ,r use of his 
forces — now well over 1,000,000 men. He was completely 
successful. On September 26 he began another operation, 
winning the forest of the Argonne, and pushing in October 
toward the German railroad line at Sedan. The control of 
this region by the Allies would throw the whole German 
army into confusion. 

483. The Armistice, November 11, 1918. Before Sedan 
was reached by the Americans, or ]\Ions by the British 
(which they were anxious to retake for reasons of senti- 
ment), the Central Powers were aware of their defeat. First 
Bulgaria, then Turkey, then Austria-Hungary begged for 
peace and accepted the terms set by the Supreme War 
Council. Germany was left alone; and in Germany the 
common people started a re\olution against the Kaiser and 
the military party. On November 9 the Kaiser sought re- 
fuge in Holland, and two days later the envoys of the Ger- 
man Government signed an armistice agreement imposed 



5o8 THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER 

upon them by the victorious Allies. There were now more 
than 2,000,000 Americans overseas, with more to come, 
and with unlimited resources to back them up. The war 
was won. England, Belgium, and France had saved the 
world; first by their resistance to the German invasion; 
then by their patient holding of the line until enough 
United States troops arrived to turn the tide of battle. 
No single nation among the Allies won the war, but all of 
them, united at last in the Supreme War Council. If this 
could only hold together it would be, as it already was, a 
League of Nations. 

484. President Wilson goes to Paris. A few days after 
the signing of the armistice, President Wilson announced 
that he would himself go to Europe, to sit as a member of 
the Supreme War Council, and to act as an American rep- 
resentative at the Peace Conference. The unity among the 
Allies that had won the war was largely due to his leader- 
ship. He had led in showing to the German and Austrian 
peoples the crimes of their rulers. He had promised that 
the LTnited States would be willing to become a partner in 
the right kind of a League of Nations. And he had stated, 
in January, 191 8, " fourteen points " which were necessary 
to be included in a fair treaty of peace. All the Allies, and 
now even the Central Powers, had expressed approval of 
his fourteen points. He was needed in Paris to help include 
them in the final treaty. No other President had ever gone 
to Europe ; but no other had ever had need to go. He sailed 
on the George Washington on December 4, 191 8, and was 
greeted at Paris, Rome, and London as no other American 
had ever been. To the people of Europe he seemed to rep- 
resent the miracle that had saved them from Germany, 
and to promise them that there should be no more wars. 

485. The League of Nations. The Peace Conference — 
including as yet only the Allied nations — held its first ses- 
sion January 18, 1919, after several weeks of conferences 
among the Allied statesmen and within the Supreme War 
Council. In a few days the delegates agreed to frame a 



WHAT WE ARE FIGHTING FOR 509 

League of Nations as a part of the peace treaty, and ap- 
pointed committees to study this, as well as such other 
matters as boundaries, reparation, punishment, and labor 
conditions. On February 14, the outline of the League of 
Nations was read to the Peace Conference by President 
Wilson, who was chairman of the committee that drew it 
up. There started at once, all over the world, an earnest 
discussion as to whether there ought to be a League of Na- 
tions and whether this was the best possible kind. The next 
day President Wilson started back to the ITnited States. 

486. The Death of Theodore Roosevelt. On January 6, 
1919, Theodore Roosevelt, the greatest private American 
citizen, died. Since the death of General Grant in 1885 (see 
par. 383), no American had left so many of his fellow-citi- 
zens with a sense of grief and loss. After his retirement from 
the presidency in 1909, Colonel Roosevelt's judgment had 
been sought in every crisis; and through his whole career 
he had stood for good government as he saw it, for clean 
life and high ideals. He proudly wore four stars in his ser\- 
ice pin during the Great W^ar, and when his youngest son 
was killed in action, his loss was the nation's. He was buried 
as a quiet country gentleman, near his home at Oyster Bay, 
with members of the New York police force that he had 
loved and serv'cd on guard at his grave, and with aviators 
circling above and strewing flowers over it. 

487. The Eighteenth Amendment. A new amendment 
to the Constitution was proclaimed in January, 19 19. This 
was commonly known as the " dry " amendment, and 
had been urged by temperance reformers for many years. 
Many of the States had already excluded alcoholic drinks 
by their own action, and under the principles of local op- 
tion and prohibition most of the area of the country was 
dry. Under the new amendment the manufacture, sale, 
transportation, import, or export of intoxicating liquors 
for beverage purposes was prohibited. This will become 
effective January 16, 1920. 

488. Problems of Reconstruction. The visit of Presi- 



5IO THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER 

dent Wilson to France was cut short by the need to sign 
bills and assist Congress in its closing days. Congress suf- 
fered in his absence, from the uncertainties of the future, 
and from the anger of some of its members because he had 
left the United States. The elections of November, 191 8, 
assured a Republican majority in the House of Representa- 
tives after March 4, 1919; and members of the Republican 
party tried to block laws so as to leave the whole business 
of reconstruction to a Congress that they might dominate. 
No other war had so greatly upset the life of ordinary peo- 
ple. Russia, Germany, and Austria were in revolution. 
The problem of reconstruction- was whether revolution 
should spread over all the world, or whether the discontent 
producing revolution should be lightened by 'wise laws. 
Food was high and work was scarce. New laws were 
needed to help business, education, and labor and to pro- 
tect all persons in their rights in life. The war had been 
fought to make it possible for democratic government to 
exist. President Wilson believed that a firm foundation 
for peace was the first end to be gained. He remained in 
Washington long enough to approve the necessary laws; 
went to New York, where he and the only living ex-Presi- 
dent, William H. Taft, pleaded for a League of Nations; 
and then sailed again on March 5, 1919, for Paris and the 
Peace Conference. 



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